


Paint It Black

by th3rm0pyl43



Series: Nothing Left to Burn [1]
Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Gen, Prologue
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-06
Updated: 2016-09-06
Packaged: 2018-08-13 10:14:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7973140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/th3rm0pyl43/pseuds/th3rm0pyl43
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lost in uncertainty, the Dark Lord stands and broods.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paint It Black

Blood and fire, unspeakable carnage, a dreadful darkness creeping forth as knights fell and light was snuffed out all across the myriad stars - it all came rushing back in a raging maelstrom, its gravity drawing in even the embodiment of the dark pall itself.

Amber eyes snapped open behind red-tinted lenses upon which a kaleidoscope of colors danced. Caught in a rapture, the fallen angel’s mind was in another world even as voices cried out to him - voices of ghosts, people long gone, calling him by the name of a dead man. A man from whose ashes he, the Dark Lord, had risen.

_"Anakin, you’re going down a path I can’t follow."_

_Her._ She haunted him even in death. The image of her beauty, tainted by her passing like a shattered mirror, was finally beginning to fade after twenty years - and yet the memory of the fear, the _betrayal_ in her eyes still brought a stab of pain to his heart.

_"You’re hurting me!"_

There was his greatest mistake. She had died at his very hands, and his child with her - or so he had thought until no more than a week ago. 

No, he had a son with whom the Force was strong, and the boy’s light was growing brighter with each passing day, a light that he would not allow to be turned to darkness. Not while he was still breathing. 

The corners of Lord Vader’s scarred mouth twitched at the sweet irony. While he was still breathing… he could not even _breathe by himself_! He briefly wondered to whom out of all these people who called him a mechanical monster it could possibly occur that this jet-black suit of armor and skull-like mask of his were the very things that had kept him alive for decades after the fires of Mustafar had brought him to the brink of death. They were a mobile life support system, fashioned after an ancient war machine, designed to make a fearsome enforcer out of the charred remains of Anakin Skywalker.

 _I destroyed Anakin_ , the Dark Lord declared to himself.

_That name no longer has any meaning to me._

His train of thought derailed abruptly as he was spoken to.

"Lord Vader?"

Within a second, he was back within what was often called the physical world, turning to face the olive-clad Imperial officer behind him, black cloak billowing gently.

"Yes, Admiral?"

Admiral Firmus Piett looked up at his superior’s scowling mask with more respect than fear. He knew well that the Dark Lord met incompetence with lethal punishment - Piett had even seen his unfortunate predecessor disposed of that way, choked to death by invisible hands, and he did most certainly _not_ intend to fail in his duties.

"As instructed, we have set course for Kuat to have maintenance performed and additional shield generators installed at the shipyards. ETA in twenty-seven hours, fifty minutes."

"How are the preparations going?"

"Quite well, milord. The engineers are itching to get their hands on the latest Kuat Drive Yards hardware, I’ve been told."

The ebon helmet inclined in a nod of acknowledgment.

Much went unspoken between Darth Vader and his second in command. It was mutual understanding at the very least, and one might go as far as to call it the beginning of friendship - but Dark Lords of the Sith did not have friends.

"Good. Carry on, Admiral."

Painfully reminded of that fact, Lord Vader found his gaze lingering on the Admiral as the slender, rather short man bowed curtly and went back about his business. 

Piett was a good man, close to being the best in Vader’s book. He knew when to take up responsibility and when to pass on the burden, when to argue and when to meet danger with silence and a mask of military stoicism; little escaped his observant hazel eyes. One day, he would be greeted as _Grand_ Admiral Piett, the Lord of the Sith decided and turned on his heel in a swirl of black robes, allowing himself to become lost in the magnificent view he had of hyperspace.

Any lesser man would have been cautious about staring into the colorful vortex for too long for fear of a rapid descent into madness, but to Vader, there was a certain tranquility to be found in what technically was a whole other dimension. Watching the blurred stars, specks of red and blue and white smeared all over the black void of interstellar space as the crown jewel of the Imperial Starfleet zipped across the galaxy faster than light, brought peace to the Dark Lord’s otherwise restless mind - and that blissful silence he craved, for it was one of very few things that prevented him from leaving a trail of bodies in his wake wherever he went.


End file.
